Geneva Muggings Prompt Mayor to Seek a New York Remedy

By Giles Broom -
Mar 6, 2013

Geneva’s ex-mayor Pierre Maudet is
fighting organized crime in his new role as security minister as
he tackles the biggest threat to the city’s reputation since
Bernard Madoff duped some of its most illustrious fund managers.

The authorities plastered Geneva last month with posters
telling residents to beware of thieves, while police advocate
keeping valuables in bank vaults after bag-snatching increased
28 percent and pickpocketing climbed 43 percent in 2011. Knife
crime in the home of Pictet & Cie. (PFEMGDP), Lombard Odier & Cie. and 130
other banks surged by more than 50 percent that same year,
according to data compiled by cantonal police, who plan to
release 2012 figures later this month.

“I’m determined to reverse the trend,” said Maudet, 35,
who was the city’s youngest mayor and is now deploying police to
crack down on criminal gangs from Lyon and Marseille in
neighboring France. “Guaranteeing an image of safety for Geneva
is crucial, including for international companies based here.”

Geneva’s millionaire lakeside mansions, designer boutiques
and access to ski resorts such as Verbier and Megeve helped lure
hedge fund managers and commodity traders, including Brevan
Howard, Vitol Group and Gunvor Group. The appeal of a city where
residents left their doors unlocked 30 years ago is at risk as
oil trader Trafigura declares hotels in Les Paquis neighborhood
off limits for visitors and local officials turn to New York for
crime-fighting tips.

Gestapo State

“It isn’t a utopia anymore,” said Edward Flaherty, a
senior partner at Geneva law firm Schwab, Flaherty & Associates.
“We don’t want to live in a Gestapo state with customs officers
picking through our groceries, but there is a huge burglary
problem and now we are also seeing mugging and other violence.”

The increase in crime follows $7 billion of losses reported
by at least seven Geneva-based firms, including Union Bancaire
Privee, Banco Santander SA (SAN)’s Optimal Investment Services and
Notz, Stucki & Cie., from Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. Madoff pleaded
guilty to fraud in 2009 for cheating investors out of $20
billion in principal. He’s serving a 150-year term in federal
prison in North Carolina.

Maudet, who as mayor discussed policing issues in 2011 when
he met with his New York counterpart Michael Bloomberg, is
boosting the number of police to deal with burglary and doubling
prison capacity, the security minister’s office said. Bloomberg
is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent of
Bloomberg News.

Red-Light District

Under the banner “adopt appropriate measures to avoid a
burglary,” Geneva police are urging residents to lock their
doors and windows, empty mailboxes and maintain good neighborly
relations to deter thieves.

SGS SA (SGSN), the world’s biggest product-inspections company, is
offering free self-defense classes for about 300 employees at
its headquarters on the fringes of Geneva’s red-light district
in Les Paquis after at least three executives were assaulted.

“We’re saddened by the way the neighborhood is turning,”
said Olivier Merkt, general counsel at SGS and a Swiss who has
lived in Geneva for 20 years. “The city could do more to
improve the upkeep of the place and have some more laws on
loitering.”

Registered sex workers climbed more than sixfold to 5,200
in the eight years through 2012, Eric Grandjean, a spokesman for
the Geneva police, said today by e-mail, adding that prostitutes
may not inform the authorities when they leave the canton or
cease their activity. Most come from Hungary and France,
according to police figures.

SGS now holds events in safer, out-of-town areas after
visiting Chinese officials had their passports stolen from a bus
near the company’s office.

Passport Free

Criminals from Lyon and Marseille have robbed banks, post
offices and jewelry stores in Geneva since 2009 when Switzerland
joined the European Union’s passport-free zone and border
restrictions were eased, said Nicolas Giannakopoulos, founder of
the Geneva-based Organized Crime Observatory.

Residents in the village of Anieres on the outskirts of
Geneva, where lakefront homes sell for more than 20 million
francs ($21.2 million), hired private security company Guardian
Protection SA after Swiss police failed to deter the crime
syndicates from France. A local cafe and at least four homes
have been burglarized during the past 18 months in the district
where about 2,500 people live, according to Teresa Neciosup, a
waitress at Au Petit Panier.

‘Lock the Doors’

Anieres, which backs on to the French border that encircles
Geneva, is a target for gangs from Lyon as France’s second-
largest city is only a two-hour drive away, said the village’s
assistant mayor Pierre Chollet.

“In 1980, you could leave a property open,” Chollet said
in an interview from the village hall overlooking the vineyards
of La Cave de la Cote d’Or. “Now you have to lock the doors and
install an alarm.”

In Geneva, the amount of graffiti blighting the city also
is on the rise. Maudet, who as mayor set up a unit to curb
graffiti, saw the outside walls of his office vandalized with
doodles and scrawls last month.

“We have a decay in the quality of life in our city, which
requires swift responses from the authorities,” said Guillaume
Barazzone, a 31-year-old local politician in charge of municipal
police, who also wants to rectify shortages of housing and
daycare capacity.

Latest Statistics

The crime wave hasn’t hurt Geneva’s ability to attract
people to work at the United Nations, said Corinne Momal-Vanian,
a spokeswoman for the organization that employs 1,600 in the
city.

Geneva is less dangerous than Dubai or Singapore, according
to a 2011 study by New York-based Mercer LLC that ranked Vienna
as the safest and Baghdad as the least safe of 221 cities
surveyed. The Swiss city was the sixth-safest, while London and
New York shared 68th place.

When 2012 crime statistics are published later this month,
they may show a decline in some property-related offenses,
including burglary, according to Laurent Forestier, a spokesman
for the Geneva police.

While the city’s banks don’t see safety and quality of life
as significant problems, the “aggressive” approach to solving
crime and graffiti are being viewed positively, according to
Steve Bernard, managing director of Geneva Financial Center, a
lobby group.

“I’m not saying everything is perfect, or that we are back
to the leave your door unlocked situation of the 1970s, but the
Geneva population and police needed time to adjust to the new
threat posed by non-domestic criminal groups,” Bernard said.